Inherited Fashion Items

It sometimes seems as though everything in style now has been stolen from a previous decade. Whether it is bucket hats (popularized in the 1970’s as a comfortable alternative to fedoras), platform shoes (brought mainstream largely by the Spice Girls during the 1990’s) or anything in between, whatever is “in” now is probably recycled from another generation. Being the fashion savvy liberal arts students that we are, we like to take advantage of this. Lucky for us, most of our parents grew up in just the era that thrift stores and vintage boutiques try so desperately to imitate.

For this shoot we photographed and interviewed three fashionable Sarah Lawrence students about their favorite inherited items of their wardrobe.

Miko

Q: How did you get these items?

A: I found the jacket in my closet by chance. This jacket was passed down from my grandfather to my father, to me. The vintage Doc Martens were my dad’s. I asked for and they got sent to me here at school. And the pants I got when I started riding. My mom used to wear then when she was about twelve. The Prada backpack was my moms also.

Q: Which item is your favorite and the most sentimental?

A: Probably the backpack. It used to be my baby bag to carry diapers in and stuff. Sometimes I use it when I don’t have to carry a lot. I put books in it and bring it to raves.

Q: Who could you see wearing this outfit?

A: My mom. She would wear all these things together.

Diana

Q: How did you get this shirt?

A: This is my mom’s from the 80’s. A couple years ago I was helping her clean out her room and I found this in a box. I found a bunch of old jewelry of hers from South America and it was all wrapped in this shirt. She’s in that stage of her life where she’s okay shedding her stuff, especially because I’m her only daughter. We had a nice group activity where we cut the shoulder pads out of it…

Q: Does it have sentimental value to you now?

A: Definitely. I was thrifting in Brooklyn a while ago and I found a shirt that’s the exact same style but it’s of a parrot and in 3D. So I bought it in honor of her to pass down to my kid.

Q: Who could you see wearing this?

A: I could see you guys wearing this…or Carry Brownstein from Portlandia.

Kacey

Q: How did you get this shirt?

A: This shirt was my mom’s. She said that she’s had it since the 70’s . It was probably just “in” back then and not from a thrift store or anything. I stole it from her when I was searching for a suitcase in the back of her closet. This happened to be in one of them so I decided to just pack my clothes on top of it.

Q: Does it have sentimental value to either of you?

A: It’s like the only thing from my mom’s wardrobe that I’ve seen and been interested in wearing myself, so sort of. She still is unaware that I took it. I doubt she’d even recognize it as hers at this point.

Q: Who can you see wearing this?

A: I could definitely see the fresh prince in this shirt.

It’s hard to imagine kids in 20 years being interested in wearing current trends of the early 2000’s, but after seeing some of these saved vintage items, maybe you’ll want to hold on to some of your favorite modern ones!